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Holiday stories

I wrote a story for my online friends for this holiday season. It's a nice way to give everyone a gift; somehow no one seems to mind sharing a story with others; at least no one has complained yet.

If you're wondering, this was done to two prompts provided by Facebook friends. One asked for a snow covered mountain, and the other for a Hawaiian yeti throwing snowflakes. So theis is what I came up with.

A White Christmas
by Anne Elizabeth Baldwin

“Hey, everybody! Mauna Kea has snow on it! You have to come and see!” Kimo called.

“The Mountain has snow? Where?” Called his cousin Pearl.

“All over the top! Come see! You’ve got a good view from the back porch!” Kimo called.

Out dashed Pearl, with Diana and Nani, their two younger cousins close behind. Kimo scooped up Nani under her armpits, giving an extra lift with one knee so she could lean on the railing. “Look, Nani, snow!”

“Yes, snow!” Nani grinned as broadly as any preschooler viewing a great treat.

Pearl turned to scoop up little Diana so she could see over the railing. “See the snow, Diana?” She pointed towards the mountain, which had a good cap of snow after last night.

“Snow, snow, snow!” the toddler chanted, captivated with the white cap on the blue mountain.

Their Aunts, Uncles, and parents trooped out of the house to join the kids.

“Yes, that’s a good cap of snow,” David said to his nephew, Kimo, as he came to stand by him.

“You know what that means, Gilbert,” Madge said wryly, bringing up the rear.

“We need to make a snow run, since we’re the ones with the pickup truck.” Gilbert smiled at his wife.

“Yup. We’ll need babysitters; this isn’t a job for just one person, and Diana is too little to go that high, just like Nani still is.

“You do realize you have four babysitters and two more helpers?” Liko asked, grinning at his sister-in-law. “I’m sure my Kimo will be just as keen to help you as David’s Pearl. Besides, we’ve got to watch my Nani anyway.

“Oh, can we?” Kimo cried, turning to look at the adults.

“Yes, please?” Pearl wheedled.

All six adults smiled and nodded. After all, it wasn’t often the mountain had this much snow.

*****

“Now, everybody out. We got to get this truck loaded up with snow so we can some down to Nani and Diana.”

“Sure, Uncle Gilbert. We’ll help you and Auntie Madge… aah!” Kimo twirled around, to find his cousin Pearl giggling into snowy gloves. “Pearl! I’m going to get you so hard…”

Pearl turned around to lumber thru the snow, with Kimo going right after her.

“Looks like we’re doing all the work again,” Madge said wryly.

“They’re kids, finally big enough to come up to the snow on top of the mountain. What did you expect?” He asked his wife with a grin.

“That we’d be doing all the work again while they played in the snow. Of course.” Madge winked at her husband.

“They’ll remember to come back to help when we’re between half and three quarters done,” he told her. “Besides, it was your idea to bring them along when we saw the mountain had a good cap of snow this morning.

“True, true. Even shoveling snow is fun when you’re this new to it. Besides, I don’t want them to miss this. It’s only Pearl’s third chance to play in the snow in two years, and Kimo hasn’t had that many more,” Madge agreed with a smile.

Gilbert just chuckled as he watched his niece and nephew run off. Officially, the kids were here to help him and his brother’s wife get snow for the little ones to play with down where they could enjoy it, but he hadn’t brought them up for that yet without them spending more time playing in the high snow themselves than helping him load his pickup with enough for the little ones to have something to play with down where they had more oxygen to breathe. He wished he could just bring them up, but it’s supposed to be better to wait until they’re nearing their teenage years, like Kimo and Pearl.

*****

Kimo chased Pearl right up the hill, following the giggles when the red hat and blue coat dipped out of view.

Then the giggles stopped.

Kimo frowned, then ran even faster. Nobody had better be giving his cousin Pearl any trouble! He ran right around a boulder… and skidded to a stop.

There was Pearl, peering over a smaller boulder. She turned, and held a finger to her lips. Then she turned back to look over the boulder.

Kimo went over to her, and peered over the boulder carefully.

There was a tall man wearing a furry snow suit. He dance around, then bent over, grabbed some snow, and threw it up into the air. Then he danced some more, and threw snow again. Then he turned around…

He wasn’t a man at all! He was a creature. Kimo couldn’t call him a monster, not with that happy a grin on his face. He spotted the children, and bowed. Then he reached down, and scooped up something from the snow. He slowly, carefully came over, and cautiously held out one hands towards Kimo and Pearl. In his hand were two large, icy things that looked like snowflakes do in pictures, when they’re shown far too large compared to real snowflakes, so you can see the detail.

Kimo reached out and took one. So did Pearl. The creature then bowed, and began to dance again, throwing snow and grinning broadly. When he stopped and bowed again, the children clapped delightedly, tho their clapping was muffled by their gloves. After this bow, the creature turned, and dashed up the mountain. Pearl and Kimo watched until he’d disappeared over a hill. They stared after him, neither sure what to say.

Finally, Kimo smiled, and tucked the creature’s gift into his pocket. “I’m not sure what he was, but he was special.”

“Yeah, he really was,” Pearl agreed, tucking hers in her pocket as well.

Kimo sighed. “Well, we’d better get back to help Uncle Gilbert and Aunt Madge load the snow into the truck.”

Neither Kimo nor Pearl told their aunt and uncle about the creature. They didn’t know what to say, and suspected they wouldn’t be believed anyway. But when they got back, Kimo grabbed Pearl, and hung back as Uncle Gilbert and Aunt Madge went to get the little ones from inside the house.

“I want to share that creature’s gift with Diana and Nani,” He said quietly when the grownups had left.

“Ooh! Good idea. I do, too!” Pearl said, grinning.

They each reached into their pocket, and took out the gifts, only to find they’d half-melted. Kim and Pearl looked at them disappointedly.

“Well, we can show them anyway, and tell them what they looked like at first,” Kimo decided.

“Yeah,” Pearl agreed.

So they beckoned the two little girls over when they came out to see the snow Uncle Gilbert and Aunt Madge had fetched for them. Kimo held his out to Diana, while Pearl held hers out to Nani. The two little girls reached towards, them, eyes wide in wonder, before their older cousins could explain. They each touched one, and suddenly all four cousins were holding enlarged snowflake-like things even more intricate than the creature’s original gifts…. And somehow feeling much more solid an dpermanent this time.

All four cousins exchanged grins. They carefully tucked their snowflakes back into their pockets, somehow sure they wouldn’t melt again. Then all four dashed off to play in the snow from Mauna Kea.

Kevin Flynn: The Grid. A digital frontier. I tried to picture clusters of information as they moved through the computer. What did they look like? Ships, motorcycles? Were the circuits like freeways? I kept dreaming of a world I thought I'd never see. And then, one day... ...I got in!